Albania PM Blamed For Drug Trafficking Scourge

“Albanians have gathered here against a dangerous enemy, which seeks to destroy our freedoms and deny us our European dream,” the chairman of the Democratic Party, Lulzim Basha, told supporters.

“This enemy is narcotics trafficking, which in the last six months, sponsored by the drug barons, has reached dangerous levels,” he added.

At the rally held in front of the government offices, the protestors held banners reading, "Albania toward Europe, not Columbia," and "You are the mafia and we are the police."

Albania is source of marijuana production in Europe. According to the Italian financial police, the outlaw village of Lazarat alone, close to the Greek border in southern Albania, last year produced an estimated 900 tons of marijuana.

Not a day goes by in Albania without the police seizing large quantities of marijuana.

Although drug production and trafficking was also high when the Democrats were in power, Basha said Prime Minister Edi Rama should resign.

“We gathered here to banish the oligarchy of drugs and point the finger at Edi Rama as the person responsible, calling on him to resign,” he said.

“The citizens have toppled Rama morally and the faster he goes the better it is for everyone,” Basha concluded.